The invention relates to a storage rack for accommodating cuboid-shaped piece goods, such as loaded standard pallets or standard containers, comprising front and rear vertical support elements, storage lanes extending over the rack depth, which are provided with at least two horizontal profiled supporting elements which are arranged parallel to one another in order to provide supports for the piece goods, and stop elements at the ends of the storage lanes facing away from the placement-into-storage and removal-from storage ends, wherein the stop elements are located at a level above the level of the supports.
A storage rack of this kind is frequently the smallest unit in large-scale high-bay storage systems, as are used for example by mail order companies. The placement-into-storage and removal-from-storage of the generally cuboid-shaped piece goods takes place from a cross lane by means of fork-lift trucks or by using special rack servicing appliances. The storage racks which are preferably arranged on each side of the cross lane have storage lanes which are open towards the cross lane and in which the goods or package units are arranged. Structural components of the storage racks are vertical support elements which are connected to one another by transversely arranged crossbeams. Two horizontal supports on which the piece goods can be set down belong to each storage lane. These supports are normally located on two profiled supporting elements which are arranged parallel to one another. The profiled supporting elements extend either in the direction of the rack depth, or else the front and rear crossbeams themselves serve as profiled supporting elements. The latter is conventional in the case of pallet storage racks wherein the respective pallet is supported in the region of its front edge, in the placement-into-storage direction, on the rear crossbeam and in the region of its rear edge, in the placement-into-storage direction, on the front crossbeam.
Although the placement of new piece goods into storage is often carried out automatically and with corresponding positioning accuracy it cannot always be ruled out that piece goods are placed too far in, seen from the cross lane. Placing goods too far in is disadvantageous from the point of view of later removal from storage if the rack servicing appliance does not pick up the piece good at the anticipated position, but slightly in front of same. A lack of positioning accuracy is very problematic in the case of pallet racks in which the pallets loaded with goods only rest on the front and rear crossbeams since if the goods are then placed too far in there may be insufficient support for the pallet leading to the risk that the pallet may fall.
In order to prevent the piece goods from being placed too far into storage, the storage racks are provided at their end facing away from the cross lane with stable stop elements which are anchored rigidly on the rack and serve as stops. The stop elements are located at a level above the level of the supports and thus restrict the possible placement-into-storage depth in the storage lane. They thus have a stable configuration and are fixed so that placing the piece good too far in, in relation to the rack depth, is practically ruled out.
The presence of practically rigid stop elements has the result that in cases where the goods are placed clearly too forcefully and more particularly in an uncontrolled manner in the direction of the rack depth too powerfully and more particularly unbraked horizontal forces may act on the storage rack so that damage to the rack and more particularly its supporting, components cannot be ruled out.
The object of the invention is to reduce in the case of a storage rack for accommodating cuboid-shaped piece goods such as e.g. loaded standard pallets through technically simple and commercially viable assembly means the risk that damage may occur to the rack when the piece goods are placed too hard in the direction of the rack depth.